Door-to-door sales is a tradition in my
family. My mother bought me from a door-to-door salesman when I was five weeks
old. I’ve sold everything door-to-door – from silverware to poison, drank Hemlock
three times as a demonstration. Slowly closing the eyes is an effective sales
tool. I was thirty-six when I sold my first tulip, a Red Emperor to a man on
his way to a funeral, stopped him in his driveway. He held the tulip and
sobbed. Selling tulips is selling desire. Other flower salesmen sell clichés.
The tulip is a nightmare rehabilitated, closer to a human heart than a rose. Tulips
are the ears of the dead. My work has hardened my knuckles. At the end of the
day I sit in my car and watch the sun set in the rearview mirror. The Monte Flame
is my favorite tulip, the way its orange and red petals cup every dirty secret
you’ve ever told.

Friday, June 7, 2013

Here's a description of the workshop: For those with some previous training in poetry,
this workshop focuses on creating work
which emphasizes lyrical and innovative language,
personal insight, and individual voice. In
addition, you refine your knowledge of a
number of the craft's formal elements, including
structure, imagery, metaphor, and pace, in order
to stretch the boundaries of your creative
experience. The goal is to produce work which is
ambitious and resonant.

a little about me

I'm a poet, freelance ad guy, writer, and photographer. I worked for 14 years in the L.A. office of DDB as an associate creative director. I also teach poetry at UCLA Extension; and when I’m not teaching there I teach copywriting at USC’s Annenberg School of Communication. Previously, I taught copywriting at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena for 25 semesters, and at Otis College of Art for 3. My professional life as an ad guy is pretty intense and limits teaching to one night week, though I really enjoy it. I've been lucky in the advertising world and have managed to win many awards including a Gold Pencil from the One Show and a Cannes Lion. My first full-length book of poetry, The Soup of Something Missing, published by Bear Star Press, and The Invention of Fiction, my chapbook was published Hollyridge Press. Sarabande Books published my second full-length book, Death Obscura! My next book, I'm No Longer Troubled By the Extravagance, will be published by BOA next year.

My UCLA Extension Class

interviews

Poeticdiversityinterviewed me a while back. You'll also find an interview, and I'm using the word interview carelessly, on Alexis Orgera's The Bog Poetic.

Beth Spencer of Bear Star Press interviewed me for her blog. Take a look.

Advertising Portfolio

Take a look.

Commercial from the Super Bowl

This is a commercial I wrote that appeared on the Super Bowl and won advertising awards around the world, and is in the premanent collection of a museum. In a special on television commercials, CBS said it was the fourth funniest Super Bowl commerical of all time. Another network said it was the second funniest commercial of the year.